German 21st Infantry Division

The German 21st Infantry Division was a German Wehrmacht infantry division that was active from 1 October 1934 to 8 May 1945 during World War II. The division was raised in Elbing, East Prussia, and its East Prussian origin led to it adopting a Teutonic knight as its emblem. The division took part in the invasion of Poland under the command of Kuno-Hans von Both, and it later fought in the Battle of France and on the Russian front. The division was assigned to the German 18th Army in Army Group North, engaging in a series of defensive battles and retreats to Riga in 1944. The division was later reassigned to the 3rd Panzer Army in the Tilsit area and then to the German 4th Army at Insterburg during the East Prussian Offensive, and it was encircled and largely destroyed in the Heiligenbeil Pocket in the closing weeks of the war. Some remnants of its forces escaped by sea to Schleswig-Holstein, where they surrendered to the British Army at the end of the war in May 1945.